Virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) systems are gaining in popularity and proving useful for many applications including gaming, entertainment, advertising, architecture and design, medical, sports, aviation, tactical, engineering, and military applications. Most VR or AR systems use personal computers with powerful graphics cards to run software and display the graphics necessary for enjoying an advanced virtual environment. To display virtual reality environments, many systems use head-mounted displays (HMDs).
Many HMDs include two displays, one for each eye, to create a stereoscopic effect and give the illusion of depth. HMDs also can include on-board processing and operating systems such as Android to allow application to run locally, which eliminates any need for physical tethering to an external device. Sophisticated HMDs incorporate positioning systems that track the user's head position and angle to allow a user to virtually look around a VR or AR environment simply by moving his head. Sophisticated HMDs may also track eye movement and hand movement to bring additional details to attention and allow natural interactions with the VR or AR environment.
While traditional HMDs include dedicated components, interest is growing to develop a universal HMD that incorporates a user's own mobile device such as smart phones, tablets, and other portable or mobile devices having video displays. Moreover, interest is growing to develop a universal HMD that can be produced inexpensively, is minimal in size, and can be distributed widely as a promotional item. Currently available HMDs that cooperate with a mobile device fail to accommodate a wide variety of mobile devices and are too expensive and too large to be distributed widely as a promotional item. Accordingly, it would be desirable to provide an HMD or VR/AR headset that can be used with multiple types and sizes of mobile devices and can be produced and packaged small enough to be widely distributed as a promotional item.